That big ol’ ‘simulator’ in Flight Simulator’s name certainly suggests a grasp for authenticity, but just how accurate is it really? That’s what one enterprising soul attempted to discover by playing the game while on a passenger plane, and piloting the exact same route they were travelling in real-life. Turns out it’s pretty damn accurate indeed.
The (admittedly wholly unscientific) experiment was conducted by Rami Ismail – formerly one half of celebrated indie studio Vlambeer – on a recent journey from Montreal, Canada, to Amsterdam, with Ismail documenting Flight Simulator’s progress versus the real thing over on Twitter as the journey continued.
Following a minor directional mishap on the runway during a drizzly evening takeoff, Ismail excitedly reported in to confirm that cloud entry had been mere seconds apart between the game and real-life once airborne, with a slighter larger window of difference, of approximately 30 seconds, when leaving the clouds.
A few updates and one nap later (with Flight Simulator’s auto-pilot taking over for the duration), Ismail popped back up again to share word that his aeroplane was currently two hours and 25 minutes away from Amsterdam, while Flight Simulator was just a touch out at two hours and 29 minutes. “This game is wild,” he wrote, “The clouds look the same”.